New Localization System Lets Perseverance Geolocate Without GPS

The Perseverance rover has been navigating the Martian surface for over five years without GPS to help it stay on course, but that's now changed. Not because there are new orbital satellites overhead it can call on, but because of a software development that allows it to compare camera feeds with telemetry maps. Leveraging the processor previously used to communicate with the Ingenuity Mars drone-copter, the algorithm can pinpoint the rover's location in around two minutes.

On Earth, we're spoiled for choice when it comes to global positioning systems. Alongside GPS, there's the Russian GLONASS system, Europe's Galileo, and China's BeiDou (BDS). But on Mars, there's no counterpart, so Perseverance has relied upon onboard instruments and Earth-bound operators to determine where it is while it's been discovering Martian electric discharges and rocks with signs of life.

The new system developed by NASA ...